In the distant future, the X universe faces a period of profound and irrevocable change. While the universe stumbles towards an uncertain future, countless adventures await as new enemies rise in search of power.

• Fixed a case resulting in non-working highway entry gates.
• Fixed several cases where crafting wares were destroyed unexpectedly.
• Fixed cases of ships full of wares not performing correct behaviour if assigned to a station.
• Fixed ships assigned to stations not using all relevant wares when station extensions introduce new products.
• Fixed lockboxes ejecting wares when destroyed.
• Fixed rare case of missing specialists on stations in some newly-started games.
• Fixed player-owned ships reporting attacks by player.
• Fixed reputation not being lost when player-owned ships destroy objects.
• Fixed several issues with crafting missions.
• Fixed ship damage not being taken into account when selling ships.
• Fixed stuck production in some production modules in certain older savegames.
• Fixed incorrect boarding pod position when claiming an ownerless ship.
• Fixed case where damaged ships could become stuck when sold due to missing Engineer.
• Fixed command info incorrectly displaying 'Undocking' in several cases.
• Fixes clicks on zone map on objects in zones other than the current one.
• Fixed stuck holomap zoom if changing zoom direction under certain conditions.
• Fixed inconsistent behaviour when selecting gates on the holomap.
• Fixed rare case where map failed to display proper object.
• Fixed info locations not being visible while in Scanner/Hacker drone if Skunk is too far away.
• Fixed stations attacking objects that are too far away when player is not present.
• Fixed discount from "unknown faction" in certain gamestarts.
• Fixed unnecessary reputation loss events in some cases.
• Fixed some instances of overlapping text in menus.
• Fixed secondary resources usage.
• Fixed player-owned ships not reacting to neutral ships attacks.
• Fixed incorrect behaviour of ships escorting other ships when the escorted ship is destroyed.
• Fixed certain shipyards not having miner or collector drones in their inventory.
• Fixed weapon panel not showing the correct weapon for the Heavy Laser MK1.
• Fixed reversed buy/sell text in planned trips info in some cases.
• Fixed overlapping menu elements in equip drones menu.
• Fixed not being able to deploy a CV to a station which already finished construction.
• Fixed inconsistencies in ware exchange info between different UI displays.
• Fixed some cases where UI was not visible when it should have been.
• Fixed case where player could be locked out of mission offer due to UI issues.
• Fixed case where game stops accepting any input.
• Fixed UI crash in encyclopedia with very long descriptions.
• Fixed some cases of employee skills not being visible.
• Fixed mission timer not showing up in menus under certain circumstances.
• Fixed upkeep mission category being displayed if there are no upkeep missions.
• Fixed missing sound when clicking on menu close button.
• Fixed missing shield generators on Teladi Phoenix.
• Fixed missing fuel storage on Teladi Albatross (Liquid).
• Fixed problems caused by the game being installed in folders with names containing Unicode characters.
• Fixed some minor memory leaks.
• Fixed various crashes caused by issues introduced by mods.
• Fixed several causes of common crashes and improved crash reporting.

About This Game

In the distant future, the X universe faces a period of profound and irrevocable change. While the universe stumbles towards an uncertain future, countless adventures await as new enemies rise in search of power. Enter a young adventurer and his unlikely female ally traveling in an old, battered ship with a glorious past - two people alone against the galaxy, playing a key part in the events to come. The fate of the universe rests in the hands of the player...

X Rebirth represents a spectacular new beginning for the X series, offering loyal fans and newcomers alike a vast, vivid and extremely detailed universe to explore throughout the game. Varied gameplay elements such as action-packed space combat, detailed trading mechanics and high-speed space exploration with fast travel allow players to experience a truly unique space saga that will keep them hooked for dozens of hours. X Rebirth features a whole new user experience - it is easier than ever to start with, and remains as deep as fans expect it.

FEATURES

++ Every ship you see has a task. Stop a freighter from reaching its destination and its cargo will be stopped too, causing prices to rise. ++

FIGHT! From small scale skirmishes to epic ﬂeet encounters, battles in the X Universe know no limits. Choose to ﬁght for the military, work for the police or be a lawless pirate, or if you prefer just ﬁght when you need to defend yourself - it's up to you.

++ Take the action right into massive structures. Target turrets and shield generators to weaken your enemy, damage engines and jump drives to prevent their ships from escaping, or stop their factories producing to cripple their economy. ++

BUILD! Create your own empire! From trading stations to large factories, farms to hightech military complexes, everything can belong to you. Build for trade and proﬁt or to strengthen your military presence and dominate your enemies.

++ Extend and upgrade your stations to make them operate more efﬁciently, with every element visible in glorious animated detail. Harvest your own resources to keep your empire running smoothly. ++

THINK! A rich, detailed history and a deep complex plot await you, but you are free to decide when and where to take part. Explore the universe at your own pace - choose your own path and create your own destiny.

++ Get up-close and personal with aliens and humans alike. Land on stations, meet people, then accept missions from them or hire them as crew members for your ships. ++

TRADE, FIGHT, BUILD, THINK... in the X Universe - the biggest sandbox this side of the galaxy.

With the release of X Rebirth 3.0 the game is finally at the point that most people would have hoped for at release. There are still a few rough edges and design decisions that some might find mind-boggling, but overall it is a great space game that can be polished with the use of a number of mods, some of which bring back classic X features such as automated galaxy traders and miners. (as of the 13th of December 2014 mod makers are still updating their work for the new patch, some mods are temporarily out of action)

It is important to keep in mind that X Rebirth is an ambitious game for a smaller studio, as such there will always be the QA problems relating to small teams that have the ambition to make big games, like bugs working their way in, and lacks of resources meaning change doesn't happen as fast as gamers would like. To give Egosoft credit, they have adopted extensive community beta testing for each patch so the game is tested on as many different rigs as possible. On my most current playthough I haven't found a single plot stopping bug, in more general freeplay I rarely find a bug, let alone one that blocks me doing what I want to do.

As a gamer I would recommend trying to get this game on sale if possible—the game is almost a year old so paying $50 is still on the expensive side. If you really are desperate for a space game fix then go for it, but keep in mind the price will probably be dropping significantly in the near future. However, in saying that, I'd like to think people can find value in X Rebirth even if they pay full price.

There are still some annoyances in the game such as expected bread and butter features missing from the vanilla game (a lack of FOV adjustment is a pertinent example). But these things, as illustrated by the addition of a great new gravidar, new menu system, and external camera system, seem to have been identified, working their way back into the game as Egosoft move from bug squashing to remedying design oversights. You can now do things like transfer freight and drones between ships, and build stations in empty space, creating a new zone with 7 build points that you can rename. As of 2.51-3.0, many modders seem to be finding their feet. As the engine is tweaked for performance, and bugs are squashed, it looks like X Rebirth might be headed towards a golden age of modding (if current offerings are anything to go by). The Teladi Outpost DLC brings back more classic exploration, kind of like exploring some of the rim sectors in Freelancer which is a welcomed addition to the X Series. Also the new music in Teladi Outpost is awesome, 1980's inspired synth-pop goodness, perfect for a space game.

The AI can still be a bit flakey at times, but is improving with every regular patch. Commands for capital ships are still a bit limited: You either set them off on an automated task, or give general orders such as "attack this", "fly to zone", "fly to my position", "patrol" etc. The closest I can think of is it operates a bit like Nexus: The Jupiter Incident (without the GUI)—you give the commands to an NPC captain through comms, or if you use the Co-pilot conversation mod, through keyboard shortcuts. There are a number of significant mods in alpha state at the moment that look to improve AI behaviour (in addition to Egosoft's on going work in this area).

The economy is running well. New trade software means you can lock in more trades, and a mod like Yorrick's YAT (yet another trader), adds the option of automated galaxy, system, and cluster traders and miners. These all seem to run fairly well with a miniumum need for any micro. The economy is simulated but not 100% real, so the AI still makes use of a number of crutches, but this really doesn't affect the game much, at most it means the player can no longer make obscene profits for doing not much at all. That said, I still make plenty of credits in my most recent game start to keep expansion running smoothly, and the economy is flowing along well. However, if the AI using a crutch is a big deal to you there is a mod that removes the wares from ships spawned by the AI.

GAMEPLAY: ASPECTS I ENJOY

One part of Rebirth that I enjoy is the set up: slowly building an empire, amassing stations and capital ships, setting patrols, essentially minmaxing an empire. If anyone remembers playing with lego as a kid, it's kind of comparable to that: you set up a cool base, build lots of vehicles, get a crew together, then muck around - it is a similar kind of ethos involved in the X series but with the level of interactivity we expect from PC games.

At the moment I have about 10 stations that all support each other while producing wares to keep the galactic economy running, I have top of the line freighters and miners assigned to each station, and defense fleets that patrol my territory protecting my assets. I have named each ship and station individually with all the most well crafted names I could think of (and some stolen from famous Sci-fi and fantasy), prefixed with Iain M. Banks designations of GSV, GOU etc with a few of my own new designations. The little things like setting up an empire in this detail are what makes games of the X series fun.

If this kind of empire building appeals to you then you will like Rebirth. While my empire is building, I do missions, capture ships, place trade agents on stations, increase my rep with factions, get achievements, role-play and so on. With Litauen's 'Capital Ship Bridges' mod I often sit on the bridge of a frigate ordering profitable trades as it escorts one of my galactic freighters. Then at other times it's just enjoyable to sit back, parked up in one of the zones occupied by my stations and watch the empire hum along. Personally I think if you are expecting a straight-up fighter combat space sim you will be a bit disappointed (there is still lots of fighter combat but it is not the primary focus), the wider aspects of Rebirth such as the empire building are where this game shines.

Even if you decide to not follow the plot the feeling of flying around in space just exploring, seeing new places, and observing the galaxy going along with its business around you is incredible. A number of mods can improve this experience such as 'Ency's mod'* (link at bottom of review) that modifies planets, and adds nebula to create breathtaking vistas and lighting.

PERFORMANCE

Personally I get okay performance, my set up is:

Nvidia GTX 760Intel 4670K8 gig of ram24" IPS @ 1920 x 1200

I run adaptive vsync at half refresh on max settings in game, including all the driver side bells and whistles from Nvidia control panel, it sticks at 30fps. Some people might like higher frames but as long as the framerate is consistent and the game looks pretty I'm fairly happy.

KEY TO ENJOYMENT: EMBRACE MODDING AND STEAM WORKSHOP

A good idea when approaching X Rebirth is to embrace modding. The support of Steam Workshop means you can easily pick and choose features, removing things you don't like about the game and picking up new features generated by modders. Check out my curated collection of mods below for a number of improvements that save time and improve the game by adding handy new features, immersive changes, and the removal of annoying ones. One mod I can't support enough is the capital ship bridges mod—simply brilliant.

Remember there is no such thing as a "modified" tag in Rebirth, modding doesn't ruin achievements and Egosoft intentionally made the game easy to mod and added Steam Workshop support, they almost expect us to mod our games and personalise our experience, this means Egosoft can realise their artistic vision of what Rebirth should be and the gamers can have ours—we all win.

After a year of bug fixes and added features, this game starts to come nearer to an entity like it's predecessor, but in it's own right.

It's now playable, I haven't gotten the game breaking save bugs and other random crashes that were plaguing my initial attempts to play this game.

(Edited with later game experiences within parenthesis)

The Goodish

I myself personally enjoy acting like a commander of a large fleet sending my ai companions into battle to kill off or be killed off by large xenon and pirate capital fleets. This is where the game shines to me in comparison to previous X games. If you don’t enjoy watching things unfold from the sideline and only enjoy the flying around capturing new ships to use part of the old X games for yourself I’ll stop you here and not recommend the game to you, unless you like having them alongside you then by all means proceed.

Mining is vastly improved though! <<< Like really a hell of a lot better mining system. (still not required for a successful game experience, highly recommend it when you have the extra cash, at least from an automated standpoint when you need to supply your own stations with materials. Otherwise continue stealing freighters)

Fewer menu trees (though it’s only good in theory because the automation isn’t there so you just have to hope there is a command you need in whatever situation you got into… if you’re doing combat mission don’t forget to remove your mining ships from your squad)(I’d of prefered more menu choices with less of a hierarchy from X3 so that they weren’t hidden away.)

The bad things that I see in this game are mostly from a lack of automation available to the player in the old X games and missing fleet commands that really weaken the whole spin on having one ship through the whole thing. --If I have to spend 10 min sending orders to trade out, that’s not a better trading system in my book it’s a depreciation of something that was much better in the old X games.

Player Stations I’m really disappointed that they are limited to defined areas within zones, the ability to set-up outposts anywhere in X3AP was so cool and satisfying that as I write this I almost feel like hopping over removing tubes and starting a real empire. That being said I do prefer the new player station system as a whole, but the lack of freedom here brings it down to a level below it’s original roots with station complexes. (After getting more hours into the game and scaling up my own economy, I really must say that the game falls way short here, I like the scaling of the stations but the building and expansion of improvements takes far too long and I don't feel like running my computer for 7hrs+ just to have a single section build waiting on supply bottlenecks because my other stations and traders are busy)

Earning cash as a whole just seems so backwards in this game that I can’t even begin to describe my disappointment in this area. In what sense should I have to spend 7-8mil to buy a ship that does an actual economic activity only to make 250k an hour when I can just go long range scan for 15min get lucky and make 1.5mil off 100 crates of station trash items. (Adding in there are really only 3 things you can do for cash, long range scan, board ships, and board ships. For a game speaking of economy as an integral part of the gameplay experience there seems to be a lack of reward for doing the most basic economic tasks in the economy, the way it is currently set-up owning mining or trading vessels is a waste of cash and you must essentially own your own economic empire to even think of making a penny from station building since you can't make a profit because of what for me seems to be a set demand basis from the other factions with their preset number of stations, they need to build more stations in zones and expand against you and other factions)

Conclusion

Anyway I don’t recommend Re-Birth over X3AP or over any game really for that matter at this point. not worth $50, but if you could get 75% off or something huge go for it.

(After putting a good solid playthrough at 50hrs into the game and scaling up to the point where I had multiple combat fleets the game just feels stale, There isn't the threat of a true pirate menace, my biggest woes are managing an economy between my personal stations and assets through a few god awful menus, or commanding a fleet to jump in or out of combat zones as I wreck, or get wrecked, by the npc faction I feel like killing at any moment. When the ships do get into fights it's a pretty beautiful light show, but that's about all it has going for it at this point. It's fun for a bit, but after the first few station sieges and capital battles you're just grinding in a single player game to grind. You can't effectively manage the systems you take and you can't produce new factions of resistence to your mighty fleets.

----I'm quite peeved that I can't command Xenon I's which I consider the most beatiful ships in the game and the producers of some of the better laser light shows when carriers and destroyers jump in.

What Would Improve it!AIThis game could be better with an overhaul to the menu choices and npc faction ai, micro and macro level ai combat and economy, something that allows for recognition of a certain asset level allowing for new diplomatic options with the factions as an equal, or something to that extent, allowing for a scale up of fleets sent at you or to assist you in zones that you have influence over determined through % assets in system

Better Ship Designs --- Why are "half" the ships that are flyable freaken flying Y's that's great and all but I like where the designers went with the xenon I sleek and tons of guns. If I have one ship I better be getting one helll of a show.

Less congested menus, maybe even more of them just less hidden trees of menus, I don't know, but as it is now it's rather annoying. It's like there was no change from the previous games with the continued use of hidden menus. It wasn't a problem in the old menu system of too many menus it was the hidden options, at least for me, that caused the problems.

Trading needs to be automated beyond station purchases, I am going to advocate for an exporting trade option beyond inter station purchases of my own assets. ....unless I somehow missed this and it's a hidden option i'd like to be able to set a trader to export finished products rather than wait for my station to lower the price of its' goods. pricing sliders solves this issue

Fleet Management and Supply --- Really needs to be betterI want sliders for automated purchasing amounts of drones and ammo with fleet managers that have accounts, as it is now I can only manage one fleet at extremely poor efficiency time wise, literally takes me 2hrs to get all my ships repaired, stocked, and all while making sure they are in the right places.)

...Might Update as I play more, if I play more and flesh out more of my experiences with newer updates or if I think of more issues/positives. --updated after another 30hrs for a total 89hrs (left the game on over night twice to build stations subtract 12hrs, but I count that as actively playing)

note I'm probably done playing until the expansion release. I'll be starting a new save to get the experience fresh to add to this and any other projects if there are any changes that will affect the early low free capital gameplay.

With the 2.50 Patch the game is now where it should have been when released, that is, really playable, hardly any ruining game bugs.

Now you can start from scratch, earn cash with your long range scanner, get some money for your first little traders (gigurum), make deals with stations, earn reputation through missions, make deals with trader agents to keep station trades updated to your computer and start building your empire. And if you want your fighting rush, on hard difficulty you need to wise up to survive battles against more than a 3 small ships and capital ships are a real challenge (not like before which you could capture with no effort).

Factory building is the most rewarding and polished thing in this game, building your complexes bit by bit, to make huge profits later on (if you do the proper ones in the proper locations obviously, Fusion Reactors anyone!? wink wink)

All the game needs right now is exploiting exploration to a greater extend, add hazardous areas, npc factions with more life, etc. but that is already coming in December it seems, anyways, with a bit more stretch in the end-game, that is, what makes sandbox games interesting (lots things to do aside from the main plot story).

So I can only recommend this game as it is NOW and congratulate for a good job to Egosoft from lifting this one up from the ashes. They made a good engine but the state of release was simply rushed and aweful. Luckily they have managed it well.

Just buy it if you are into space genre, trading, factory building, exploration (later on), huge cap ship fighting, etc..

2.20 ReviewWhen I was first set loose in X: Rebirth's vast universe, right after it's release, I was convinced it was going to be amazing. But I quickly realised that this was, in fact, a colossal supernova of bugs and ♥♥♥♥♥♥ game design that refuses to let you have any fun – and I really tried. I forgot about the game for a while, and came back to play the 2.20 update, hoping that the game would be fixed by now. I was disappointed, again.First problem: you only get to pilot one ship, the horribly named Albion Skunk. You're able to explore it using a first-person mode, which could have been fun if there were more than two rooms to it, and if anything was even slightly interactive. The cockpit is cluttered and restrict your vision horribly, and it took me a good while to find some of the most important HUD elements, such as the speedometer. Which isn't that well done either. Eventually I found a guy that sells different cockpits, ehich there are four of. And so, I was saved from the horrors of the stock cockpit by bying the very open, combat-oriented one.If I remember correctly EgoSoft said that there's only one ship to incease immersion and that they couldn't have made the capitalship gameplay fun while keeping the mobility realistic. Well, changeing ships has worked just fine in the other games. I would've paid extra for the ability to change into something with more than one gun. Even if it was just a frikin' shuttle.Then there's your co-pilot, Yisha. For a character you spend the entire game with, and who's almost constantly talking, you'd think they would have hired someone with some basic acting ability to speak her lines. But while you'll eventually grow used to her awkward delivery, you'll never stop cursing how useless she is. Case in point: if you're piloting a drone, and enemies start attacking the Skunk, she'll just sit there dumbly. Couldn't you, like, move, or fight back, or something? Not to mention her, and everyone else's, bad animations and ridiculous outfits. Oh, and a boob-window on a spacesuit. Because logic.Second problem: The voice acting. Oh god, the voice acting is absolutely horrible. It has to be mentioned multiple times. I could rate this game negative just because of it, but there's so much more. The game has a big problem with humans in genereal. On stations – which all look identical – you'll talk to NPCs, who are terrifying, slot-mouthed, dead-eyed mannequins. While space itself feels nicely alive, teeming with traffic and huge ships lumbering back and forth, the interiors feel lifeless and boring. In a nightclub I hear the ambient sound of people drinking and laughing, but it's empty except for two people standing motionless by the bar. Thankfully you don't really have to enter stations anymore, you now can do all interaction straight from your ship. But since it's done as a video conversation with the character you're speaking to, there's no escape from the animations and voice acting.How about something positive for a change? Stations aside, Rebirth fares much better when you're in space. Ignoring some messy shadows, it's a good-looking game, with colourful nebulas, asteroids, planets and star. The combat is like jousting in space. Ships make passes at each other, firing a volley of shots when they get close and hoping some connect. Or you can use heatseeking missiles. Hit the spacebar and you can strafe, FPS-style. Hit it again to steer with the mouse. The movement feels nicely weighty.Except that the Skunk can only mount one weapon at a time, which are all extremely underpowered compared to the fact that enemies can mount multiple ones, and have near-perfect aim. Missiles are nice, and one of the only ways to make combat work for me. The other is to fly to a station and hope the turrets kill the hostiles before you die.Third problem: you have separate ships for trading that follow you around and have to be given orders. You couldn't, and still can't, buy any trade-goods with your own ship, everything has to be done with slow and dumb freighters that can't even fight pirates reliably, despite the 20 turrets that are mounted on them. You can't cancel an order without editing your save file, and sometimes the freighter just refuses to move, breaking the entire save and preventing the plot from progressing. It's like I'm dragging a badly-behaved toddler around a shopping centre. Thank god they've fixed most of those bugs by now, but the trading UI is still slightly confusing at times and the ships are still ridiculously dumb.The UI.... One word: Useless. It's confusing and mostly useless.It's designed to work around a controller, on a PC-exclusive title.There's so much done wrong with this game, even this full A4 page of text is just the beginning. No matter what happens with stability and bug-fixing patches, its poor controls, awful interface, and dull pacing ensure that X Rebirth will remain unpleasant for all but the most forgiving, die-hard space jockeys. And oh god, the voice-acting...

I can finally recommend this game. The Devs have done a lot of hard work to fix many things, and it shows. Many people I have spoken with believe the game has gone from a 1/10 to a 7/10 and counting. The great thing about egosoft is they don't release a game and then forget about it. They constantly add to it and update it over time.

I feel like X-R at release was simply the release of a foundation/framework that was meant to be built upon over time, both by the devs and the modding community. This turned many people off because they expected a completed game with every single bell and whistle they desired. Those bells and whistles were not in at release, but they are here now. Either by the devs or the great modding community.

The devs have fixed almost every bug I've ever heard of/encountered. They have added very nice UI improvements and quality of life features.The mod authors have filled in the gaps with afew nice things, but I wouldn't be surprised if the devs added them to vanilla.

All in all I am excited for the future of the game! I am actually having fun this time around.

It doesn't matter how many times I try to get into this game, it never works properly for more than an hour before *something* breaks it. Either something I do in game, something that happens outside of my control in game that makes everything stop functioning, a random CTD, a graphical glitch or some game-breaking situation. Considering I played X3TC until I conquered half of the map and had more fleets and production facilities than I could count this game is a MAJOR diappointment. It lacks any sense of progress, and after waiting for it with glee and anticipation, paying £50 for the version that had the soundtrack (the collector editions had sold out) I really feel ripped off. In fact I've never before felt quite so ripped off and shocked as I was with this. Half of the mods people make and release for it are functions that anyone woul d have expected to already be in the game. Nothing about this game even feels like an X game should feel. I appreciate that it was supposed to be a revamp, but to me a revamp should not mean taking the top ten most amazing things from X3, deleting them and replacing them with week-old fish-paste; and that's basically all this is. Do not buy, even if you really really badly want another X game (we all did).

So I bought this game on Release day, and I have been putting off doing a review for it this whole time. I'm a veteran of the X series of games, and familiar with the development cycle that Egosoft implements. Their games are deep, and complicated; and while this one goes in a rather different direction, it is no exception.

It's just that as it was released, it was a pile of alpha code that was being charged a premium price. And really, I can't really advocate that pattern of behavior. But I do accept it, because Egosoft follows through.

They could have just given up, as a company like EA, Sony, Microsoft, or Activision would. Just leave the game as a failure and move onto something more profitable. But Egosoft continues to work on the game, refining it and polishing it to a point where it meets the expectations set out for the game in the first palce. Is this the best way to develop a game to 1.0? No. And make no mistake, what is 1.60 according to Egosoft is really 1.0 according to the fans of the series: The first version the is the full game, released as promised.

But it is here, and it is a good game. Again, not without flaws, but it is now a worthy member of the X series of games. And anyone who enjoys these types of space games is going to get their money's worth from X Reunion.

Just a final note about the reviews: Most of those negative reviews come from the initial release of the game, where it was more or less universlly panned by a righftully-dismayed crowd who purchased it. But look at the recent reviews! Now that the game is fully patched up, it is getting mostly positive reviews, and people who might otherwise reject this game becuase of that review ratio should please take note of that fact.

Let me preface by saying X Rebirth is quite possibly the most amazing-looking space game of all time. My complaints run the gamut, but graphics are not among them.* X Rebirth's developers built on a massive scale appropriate for space -- this isn't a space sim where the universe feels small, or where stations are half-hearted efforts to give players a place to dock their ships. The stations in X Rebirth are glorious affairs, with Blade Runner-esque lights and signs, intricate manufacturing modules where you can see machinery sculpting products from raw materials, nooks and crannies to hide your ship from hostile forces, and often jaw-dropping detail -- when you do a slow fly-by around space farming stations, for instance, you can see every leaf of the vegetation growing beneath massive domes, and machines strafing those spacegardens with water jets.

Likewise, the devs clearly paid attention to planetary scale. When you're in orbit around a planet, the planet should be almost incomprehensibly massive. It should dominate your field of view. And in this game it does, providing an amazing backdrop for pitched battles and ambushes. The designers also did a fantastic job of increasing visual immersion with the way the Albion Skunk's cockpit is rendered -- the ambient light in the cockpit changes with the light source from outside. That means if you're headed toward a station close to a star, your cockpit is bathed in vivid yellows. If you're in deep space, the cockpit's hues are subdued.

Still, I can't recommend X Rebirth. Lots of people have reported problems with framerate, even on high-end systems. This has been acknowledged by the developer. Personally I have not had that problem, but the problem is, it's nearly impossible to tell if the game will run appropriately until you install it on your own machine. Secondly, there is merit to the complaints about inscrutable menu systems and unnecessarily complex in-game tasks. Getting your fleet's ships to dock, refuel, and take on cargo can be a nightmare, and the difficulty is apparently arbitrary. Sometimes it works flawlessly, sometimes you're waiting an hour until you fly in to inspect the problem yourself and see that, for some reason, drones are not off-loading cargo.

Likewise, there's a difference between hand-holding and obscuring features beneath menu layers that make it difficult for players to get their bearings, nevermind figure out how certain tasks are accomplished. This is a game that can't be played without an open web browser to help get through frustratingly, needlessly complicated tasks. You'll also need the web browser for figuring out how to progress, because the game doesn't always make it clear if you're prepared for certain zones or missions.

Conclusion: Save your money. If X Rebirth plunges to $4.99 or $9.99 in some future Summer Sale or flash sale, it's worth picking up just for the joy of exploring the game's systems and starbases. And maybe, after the better part of two years, the game will be smoothed out by then. We'll have to wait and see.

* Caveat to praising the graphics: The space station interiors are pretty awful. All of them are nearly identical in decor and visual style, if not layout. It makes little sense that a civilization cut off from the rest of humanity would build stations exactly like everyone else, but there you have it. And the NPC models are so poorly done, it might have been better if the devs dropped the idea of interiors altogether.

-when you assign a ship under station, it will automatically bring needed wares - there is no way of telling the ship which exact resource it should bring (they sometimes bring stuff that is not really needed - or needed stuff is ignored, and other resources are brought)

-there is no way of forcing your managers to use your own budget (watching manager budgets can be annoying if you have many stations, especially in private stations)

-some people don't like to be limited to one ship (but then again, this is one of the main features of the game, it's something that was never promised, we knew that there's one playership for two years before the game was even released, so this is truly meaningless)

As a fan of previous X games, I pre-ordered X Rebirth and started playing it within minutes of release. Like many others, I was struck both by the sweeping changes to the “X” formula established in the preceding few titles, as well as the horrid, god-awful, soul crushing bugs and technical hang-ups.

I invested approximately 180 hours in the first couple of months, doing my best to study the universe and bludgeon my way through the infuriating campaign, and after doing so (the dev’s released a steady stream of patches through this period, turning the game from utterly broken to sort of kind of maybe just a little playable), and my private verdict to my gamer-y friends and family was “Do Not Recommend, Stay Far Away!” Which hurt a little, because I could see the game’s potential glimmering far down in the deeps.

I think the thing that troubled me most back in those early days was the fact that even if you got past the bugs, which many did by editing game files, the new universe was essentially simplistic and lifeless. Even if all the game’s systems worked flawlessly (and they didn’t, not by a long shot), there was really no point in playing because, in my opinion, the universe and the mega-stations that looked so darned pretty from a distance, were essentially just empty shells, no more interesting or compelling than glittery Christmas ornaments on a well dressed up tree.

Now fast-forward a year & umpteen patches later to the release of v 3.0 and the expansion Teladi Outpost.

What a difference a year makes. After letting the game gather dust since early last January, I finally re-booted and started a new Free Play session and dove back in. Right away, I noticed a plethora of changes, ranging from cosmetic graphics enhancements to radical shifts in the design of the game’s UI and underlying mechanics, most of which a very vocal crowd had screamed to the rafters that the dev’s either couldn’t, or wouldn’t, change a year earlier.

-The menu had been switched from a cumbersome, un-intuitive radial style menu to an easily manipulated sidebar style menu, one that was lightning fast to navigate and cool as all hell to look at. Contained within this menu was a newly redesigned map, complete with two different information modes, and a wealth of new tools for tracking and maintaining my property.

-Now there was a reason to actually go into the stations other than to crawl around inside their air ducts: to find loot that was useful for crafting items that was either worth a ton of money, or even better, could be used in exchange for virtual seminars (training videos that could be applied toward your hired officers, increasing their various stats) or even better yet, hiring permanent Trade Agents on any given station who would constantly update your trade computer with current buy/sell offers from that station, the XR equivalent to X3’s Advanced Satellite Network.

--Haulers/Traders from far off systems now populated the universe, such as the factions LI or PMC from Albion trading with stations in Omicron Lyrea, or Canterran vessels docking at the No Limits Spice Farm in Albion space. This had the overall effect of making the universe seem a lot more meaningful and bringing it to life, for me.

--Faction owned destroyers patrol and react to threats and many haulers travel with either fighter or frigate/destroyer class escorts, and the player is free to assign these kinds of escorts to his/her haulers, too.

--Redesigned mission offers & rewards; now there is always something for the pilot to do, patrolling zones and engaging in frivolous but fun dog fights, protecting stations, sabotaging rival factions’ stations, etc. These missions are plentiful and updated regularly, and function not only as a means to put some credits in the players account during the early game phase, but also to build faction rep for the later stages when the player begins to build their trade fleet/station network.

--There are now ways and means to order your squad around that actually work pretty well. Not exactly fleet management, but getting there.

--The ability to place stations anywhere I liked.

--Small shipyards open for business! More capital ship choices for purchase in general, as well as an overall increase of the types/styles/configuration of ships in the galaxy.

--Redesigned highway travel. On this note, I’d just like to point out that with the release of the Teladi Outpost expansion, Egosoft is now introducing a whole new style of sector to explore (new to XR): in Teladi space, you are given a huge area to explore, filled with hidden lockboxes, interesting new stations and nebulous electrical storms that obscure your view and potentially damage your ship, and you are not given any highways to show you the way around. This seemingly small touch does a lot to increase the sense of mystery and epic adventure that was missing from the initial release, essentially forcing the player to explore again.

--Most bugs have been squashed, leaving no game-breakers that I could find. That is not to say that XR does not have bugs, I’ve found some ranging from irritating to downright aggravating, but in all cases they were minor and easily ignored.

I could go on and on listing the improvements, but I think I’ve made my point clear that the dev’s have been hard at work tightening up their systems and introducing new content. I’ve got roughly 100 hours into v 3.0 and I feel that I’m hardly scratching the surface. The bottom line is that they’ve created a rich, compelling, beautiful space-fantasy for the player to become engaged with and tinker about in, a universe that can easily gobble hundreds of hours of the players time.

The best way to approach X Rebirth is to just enjoy it for itself and not hold it up in comparison to it’s older siblings.

Almost a year since its release, X: Rebirth is now playable. Although it shouldn't have been released in it's initial state, the developers have constantly updated the game over the last year to iron-out the bugs and improve it.

Those who already own the game are being given free DLC which will be released in December 2014, make sure you redeem the DLC before Dec as it may not be available for free after that date.

Overall I consider this a good game that has given me hours of enjoyment, not as good as its predecessors, but has a lot more potential for both immersion and modding.

After one year of public development this game got to completely another level. From unplayable trash it promoted into very fine piece with awesome graphics and still improving gameplay.If you have a look on egosoft forums, you will discover that most of hating posts are because players lack knowledge and fantasy how to handle different game scenarios.Sure, game lacks commands handling big units, but with little bit of creativity you can handle some situations and a lot of new stuff is coming in next patch.As all egosoft games, this game had (and still has few of them) issues, but with time its improving and I certainly do not regret of money I have put in it.I can sincerely recommend this game to all lovers of singleplayer space simulators aimed not only for shooting, but for building and trading as well.

Version 3.20 :X Rebirth finally delivers on a proper X3 sequel! Although X3 Terran Conflict (TC) and Albion Prelude (AP) are arguably better games for many reasons, X Rebirth is finally in a state that is worth playing. It's not perfect – there are still many graphical issues, performance bottlenecks, and annoying restrictions that keep the game from being great, but it is worth 15 or 20 dollars if you find it on sale for that price.

For fans of X3 and the series, it is worth coming back to and trying again. I waited until this time to actually get back into the game since its disappointing release. It wasn't unexpected that release day would be problematic: There was plenty of evidence that this happened to prior games in the series. Still, despite how bad the game was when it came out, Egosoft has written the wrongs right. I never had any doubt that they would get to 3.0. But for those who are still bitter about the release, their anger is justified, however outdated. X Rebirth has had a second Rebirth.

Why does this game now deserve your time? It is probably the easiest X game in the series to get started with. Unlike the other X games, the story/tutorial does explain most of what you need to know in the game. And Egosoft recently posted videos explaining advanced features that I would have never been able to figure out on my own. The missions are also more friendly, giving you the ability to make money early without drudging through 50 hours of poverty trading energy cells. This game highlights station building with an emphasis on building an empire. This is the only feature I can definitively say I like more than X3. It is my personal favorite part of the X series, and it may be the reason I end up playing X Rebirth more than the 1000 hours I put into X3.

If you are new to the X series, you may want to move on to X3 TC and AP if you're looking for more fun and more challenge after X Rebirth. AP is also easier than TC, so that game may be a preferable next step. I would recommend playing all these games with a joystick though. I use a yoke myself, and I find that much more immersive. You may also want to run the soundtrack for X Rebirth in the background -- it is absolutely awesome but half of the music doesn't seem to appear anywhere in the whole game.

In the end, this game isn't worth 50 dollars. It probably isn't even worth 30 unless you've already paid 300 bucks for a ship in Star Citizen. I'd say buy it if it's under 25 if you're a space genre fan or empire builder. This is just my opinion of course; I paid full price for the collector's edition. I have no regrets though. It was worth it for me.

Note: The Teladi Outpost DLC is a small addition of content, probably worth 3 to 5 dollars. It's nice to explore and build in a new region of space.

Being a huge fan of the X series I was shocked by the state X:Rebirth was released in:The performance was terrible, the game crashed constantly, you couldn't even play through the main story because one of the first quests just bugged out and kept you stuck. The game was a frustrating mess.My experience with Egosoft however was, that they usually continue maintaining their games over a long period of time and so I kept following the development of things as they rolled out one patch after the other.

Now, with version 3.20 I can finally say, that the game is now in a proper playable state.They fixed most of the performance issues, the story quests work as intended, station building and fleet management works fine and the AI is starting to improve as well.Finally they added more ship models, don't force you to walk around stations anymore to trade your inventory and upped the threat that pirates pose.

So, if you were thinking about getting this game but weren't sure if you really should because of the bad stuff you heard from frustrated early buyers, I think now is the time to pick it up without having any regrets.

I expect Egosoft to improve the game for a long time now, so there should be something new going on every once in a while that will keep me coming back to it and thus never removing it from my hard drive for ages.

12 months on since I bought X-rebirth, I fired it up again not having played it in some time. I decidedto just fly around shooting stuff for a change in the secret service missions and was quite surprised at how much fun this was, I would recommend this approach to those who may have given up on this or anyone playing for the first time.Still think this game was bashed for what it was'ent rather than for what it was. Ive played less entertaining games that got 70% plus scores for a few hours before I got sick of them. And the developers deserve credit for working to improve it despite such damning reviews. There is entertainment to be had here and it is getting better.

When it was released, I was very (VERY!) dissapointed, but the devs have made amazing progress in fixing it, making it playable and more ejoyable for (mostly) everyone.

Unfortunately people who were put off at the start may never return and that is unfortunate, because this is turning into a greater game with each update. (it's just take it's time... a lot of time)

But don't misunderstand, the game is still bugged and for some that might annoy you a whole lot and put you off the game for good so I recomend you go the Egosoft forums and check up on the status of the game for the current bugs and glitches, so you can determine for yourself if it's worth buying or not.

I really like the game with the new 3.0 Patch/dlc.Egosoft fixed all the technical problems i had with update 2.5 and now they added features i really wanted to have (outside of squad trading,ordering stuff to your ship etc.). I would say even if the patching took some time, now the game is a lot fun to play. Only thing I miss a bit is that there are no Borons in the game.I always loved them in X3.However they do not really fit to the lore so I can live with it.

Preordered it before it was released and stopped playing it after the release when it was buggy like hell.

Now one year later with Version 3.0 i tried it again, and the game has made a huge step forward. Its playable, havent found any gamebreaking bugs so far. Some small things are still not that great, but in general the game is playable and fun now.

While it's still unclear beyond the campaign what the purpose it is to continue playing, the overall mechanics and gameplay itself have been worked on to the point (a year later) that it's worth playing.

The dev's and supporters seem to really push on making this a worthwhile game to play. If they continue to do so it will be something incredible.

Yet. Still. It's got a mostly sandbox feel to it to build stations and earn credits but no real niche of gameplay to speak of. It would be nice if they took a glance on where they want to go with it and made it happen because what it is now is a very nice campaign that takes a few hours. Other then that,... no.

Moving into the direction of making it an RTS where you and the NPC factions actually have some sort of purpose would be nice.

Still will recommend it now, after a year because they worked on it and made it happen.

For fans of the X series, synonymous as it was with fathomless depth and expansive open-world breadth, the experienbce of playing this dumbed-down rather than simplified, hollowed out rather than pruned version is like being forced to watch one of the great master painters, a Da Vinci or Michaelangelo, deface their works with excrement for pocket change at a freak show. Have yourself a better time than that, try one of the endless new Albion Prelude mods.

For those new to the series, just trust me and go buy X3: Albion Prelude instead. Yes, you'll need climbing gear for the learning curve. Yes, it's worth the effort.